What Ever Happened to the Classic Skirmisher? You know, those agro-ridden adrenophiles who would run ahead of the main army to harass? I think that belegarth units could really benefit from a core of members whose job it was to rush forward, pepper the enemy frontline with javies and rocks, and then hit the flanks while the main body strikes center. Do you think that this tactic would be too clunky for our sport, considering that we seem to be moving further and further into incredibly mobile techniques.

_________________~There he goes.One of God's own prototypes.Some kind of high powered mutant never even considered for mass production.Too weird to live, and too rare to die.~

I don't know about out West, but in the East here there are entire units that basically do nothing BUT that. Clip across the front of a unit in hopes of drawing out the line, and then pick off the chasers.

_________________Squire to Sir Calarn the BlackPalatine and Acolyte of the Sons of Sylas"But in life, the young king becomes a tyrant, and leads his people to war."

I've seen Kargos do that. Alone. Because he's Kargos. And is fueled by our jealously and hate. I know that in Babylon we have a tradition of more skirmishing tactics ala wolf-packing with very little in the way of line battles. We try for quality of quantity lol; also I'm pretty sure that God Squad was the GELF's commando skirmisher unit developed with exactly that in mind, balanced with a focus on taking out key targets.

Skirmishing is extremely effective. I don't fight Bel/Dag as my main game, but I do play it often. In my main game there is virtually no line fighting, it's all skirmishing and charging. When I come to Dag/Bel, I notice how much people don't pay attention to their sides and back when in a line. Skirmishing and flanking is very effective.

Most fighters out west are skirmishers, or at least fight more loosely like a war band as opposed to a solid line of basically trained soldiers - with some notable exceptions. There's plenty of individual glory and baiting, if not so much screening and keeping enemies at bay/thinning numbers via missile weapons.

If you're talking about cultural variations on specific roles like the Hellenic peltastai, akontistai, or sphendonetai, the number of javelins needed to last a battle in that role is often cost prohibitive, and can also be ungainly as our weapons aren't as streamlined as their historical counterparts. Additionally, relatively fast moving and unarmored roles like this were only viable en masse, and are therefore harder to come by since its unlikely to get an entire unit, let alone a realm, to decide to take on a specific role that is so far removed from the "glory" and "fun" of mainstream battle for the good of a team at an event. The javs and arrows in our game are so large and slow moving that they are easy to block and really only regularly shine when sniping from an angle on a distracted fighter.

Would be cool to see a battle field reminiscent of the ancient days though.

_________________

Remy the Wroth wrote:

Just don't call it boffing/boffering. That's not what we do. We fight. With swords. To the sorta-death. I can't stand it when someone says boffering. Plus is means sexin' in the UK.

The other thing to remember, especially when it comes to the Greek model of warfare that Tibby just brought up, is that slinger and javelineer troops (and therefore, units) came about out of necessity of funds, not necessity of strategy. In Ancient Greece, the military did not fund soldiers with equipment; it was the responsibility of citizens to arm themselves in whatever way they could. People from the middle class, who could afford an aspis, and possibly (though not universally) armor, became heavy infantry. People from the underclasses, and slaves of the hoplites, who showed up with significantly less, were put to use however possible.

This is just one of those things that does not work on our micro level. If you had the numbers to make a decent arrow- or javelin volley (rocks are pretty worthless for this exercise), you'd be better off giving them full equipment and incorporating a more hand-to-hand skirmish, like the ones some people listed above.

A lot of credit is due to the other belegrim in the formation, but I'm so terrible with names that you'll have to excuse me.

In a variety of battles, we punched through the enemy flank so hard, that when we turned to kill the linesmen from behind, they were all screaming for us to stop team killing them, because we were on their side.

Most epic.

_________________"In Orion we trust"
"He who fights monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster...when you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss gazes into you." Friedrich Nietzsche

Belegarth ONLY has skirmishers. I haven't ever seen anyone do a proper shield wall. AT BEST you see a flying wedge or a loose wall made of skirmishers who break up and run about as soon as the enemy is engaged.Why do you think EVERY **** battle devolves instantly into a swirling toilet bowl?Many of us would like to see real shield walls. Thats why we are constantly shirking the battle fields while numbers are constantly increasing. This seems to be firming up lines. And when we can form firm lines and really get into formation fighting, you will begin see clearly defined groups of skirmishers emergeFB

_________________Warlord of the Western Uruk-Hai

Don't call it a comebackI been here for yearsRockin my peers and puttin suckas in fear

The closest thing thing to what you are wanting to see would have to be a few groups of people running from one side of their line to the other in a semi-circle going towards the enemy. Say groups of two shield men with javis or rocks and a fast firing archer that can call shots, shoot, aim, and reload while sprinting and not looking the direction theyre running. Then having the archer rejoin the line while the shieldmen perform a flank. Id love to try this with my unit on a large scale field battle, but we would have the other line charge us with people before we even got to the appex of the semi-circle